Local war hero survived ... sort of

Ralph P. Buckland, who organized and let the 72nd Ohio Volunteer Infantry, became a hero in the Civil War despite having no military experience before going off to the front.

Buckland was a hero at Shiloh, being credited with playing a major role in slowing the advance of the Rebels on April 6 and helping to lead the successful counter offensive the next day.

Throughout the war, he led the regiment, which was made up largely of Sandusky County men, to involvement and successes in numerous battles and skirmishes.

For this he was eventually made a general.

But there was a personal toll for the Buckland family of which many may not be aware.

Twenty-year-old Chester Buckland and his brother Henry enlisted in the 72nd OVI to serve under their uncle Col.Buckland. The Bucklands represented just one of many groups of soldiers in the 72nd who were related by blood. The nature of Civil War recruitment, organizing regiments from one county or adjacent towns, proved critical to soldiers and communities. I've read that soldiers drew strength fighting alongside family members, but they must also have felt the loss of a relative even more deeply. While an ill or wounded soldier could rely upon family members for help, the death of one member of a family must have been a real blow to the survivor who still must face the terrors of war.

Chester Buckland was wounded in the knee in a skirmish preceding the Battle of Shiloh. "Ohio Yesterdays" provides insight into the brotherly connection during war: "His older brother Henry ? carried Chester from the battlefield, stumbling through the smoke, mud, and underbrush to reach the river landing where hundreds of Shiloh's casualties were being loaded onto boats."

Believing the wound to be minor, Chester wrote a letter to their parents, Stephen and Lucy Buckland in Fremont, indicating that Chester would be fine.

"You need not feel at all uneasy about Chester. ?. I heard from him yesterday, and is getting along first rate. He was sent down to Savannah (Tennessee) Sunday and I have sent Arthur Fitch down to take care of him. I heard from him yesterday, and is getting along first rate. I shall go down and see him as soon as I can get away. The enemy marched through our camp and destroyed everything nearly except our tents and did part of those. All the possessions I have in the world (with the exception of my trunk which was stripped of everything) I have got on my body. I had on my blouse and they got my dress coat and in fact everything that I had worth taking."

Chester was transported by a steamboat up the Mississippi River to the Ohio, where wounded and ill soldiers were being treated at Cincinnati.

The ship may have been DA January a side-wheel steamer that served as a floating hospital and was known to have arrived on the Tennessee River near Shiloh during the battle. It contained a surgical suite, baths, a kitchen, nurses quarters, hot and cold running water, and an ice water cooler. Windows circulated air through the wards, which held nearly 450 beds. During its four years of service, the DA January transported and cared for more than 23,000 wounded men. It regularly visited the cities along the Mississippi and Ohio rivers.

Hospital ships, however, were notoriously unclean at the time.

Chester died while still aboard ship. By chance, Chester's body was discovered at Cincinnati by Fremont physician Dr. L. Q. Rawson who was traveling to the battlefield to help with the wounded. He telegraphed young Buckland's parents and then shipped the body in a metal coffin to Fremont.

Days later, family, friends, and neighbors gathered at Oakwood Cemetery where Chester was laid to rest. If only a private, Chester was the highly regarded son of one of Fremont's most prominent citizens. His former employer, the editor of the Fremont Journal, honored the memory of his promising young assistant by publishing a lengthy obituary and his letter describing his actions at the Battle of Shiloh.